


Neither deep nor fixed in stone

by laughingpineapple



Category: Myst Series
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-23
Updated: 2012-12-23
Packaged: 2017-11-22 04:42:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/605933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laughingpineapple/pseuds/laughingpineapple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Let the surface be the surface, cross its patterns when it's safe. Opportunities come and go throughout a century and Atrus plays along until modernity shuts its door.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neither deep nor fixed in stone

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Capella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Capella/gifts).



> Based on 28x11 pixels of canon aka the [Orvis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orvis) label that can be found on Atrus' End of Ages model.

“It has started”, their friend says, arriving at Tomahna's doorstep on one lazy autumn afternoon. “Progress! Watch it for me, will you? My only fear is that I won't see it with my own eyes.”

It's good when they can be lazy together, the three of them. New stories seem to have left them all behind, they might as well take their time to sit and chat.

Atrus clears his voice. “One might argue that 'progress happening' is hardly a recent development.”

“Then it's gained momentum. You haven't been to the cities, my friends. And the roads! They're building roads all over the continent.”

Catherine smiles, but her eyes don't follow. “Are you sure your amazement is fit? You keep the wonder of both worlds, from those cities to our Ages and back again. Your sight stays unclouded by monotony.”

“Still, it's not the world I grew up in. Lives are changing. Goods and people are travelling. It's a new era.”

Catherine's eyes are still sad. His wife's unspoken conclusion: people explore and move and one day, those new roads of theirs will cross D'ni.

And it will not be their part in history to see it happen.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

“We could try.”

“Or we could not.”

Catherine treasures his enthusiasm and likes to poke at it – it's a tried and true charade. If the only child they are allowed to keep in their home is Atrus himself, so be it.

“It could be interesting. It's as we were told so many years ago, remember, my dear? Goods can travel on these roads. A new possibility presented itself, I say we see for ourselves how it works.” To honour an old request, not in the least: there's only two of them left now to see this changing world develop.

“We don't need to _buy clothes_ , Atrus!”

He sits beside his Catherine and caresses her white braid. He does not want to weigh on his people in Releeshahn nor on the sparse good friends he can still count on throughout the Ages. Most of all, he does not want to weigh on her: he has seen how she modified her needle for easier threading.

They may not need it now, but they will. He will, in the end.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

Setting up this trade is fun – setting up always is, there's much to plan, to write down, to schematize. It keeps his days busy.

Money first, enough to last a lifetime of mail orders. Humankind's love for gold has not changed since the days his friend loved to report any merchant caravan stationing within half a day's walk from Tomahna. These new merchants in their faraway shops may ask more questions, which Atrus does not answer, but nobody argues with a small bag full of shiny nuggets.

“It's not pure gold”, he says out front. He is cheating already, in a way, and does not want to get more in return than his rocks are worth.

What he keeps to himself that it is, at least, pure well-known surface metals. He checked thrice to make sure.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

“To: Atrus, third canyon to the left, compose the attached code on the panel disguised as a white rock and I'll come with the gondola, please wait for me near the rails' start” does not sound like the most discreet of options, so he finds himself an address.

There's an abandoned building on the outskirts of the closest town, and he's using these words loosely, 'outskirts' and 'town', considering that the whole thing barely looks bigger than Tomahna itself – hydroelectric power plant notwithstanding. He jolts down the house's address on the courteous letter detailing his order, puts it in its envelope along with the required amount of money and makes sure that nobody sees him post it. He could play the part of the loner living in the canyons, following Anna's example from his childhood (and she only had a grandson to hide; he has _worlds_ ), but he'd rather avoid talking to his current neighbours for as long as possible. The less they know, the less they can suspect.

In this regard, the possibilities offered by mail sound just wonderful.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

The fabric's good, he notes as he tries on his first prized shirt, the seams seem strong. Nice wooden buttons. Worth all the efforts to get it, and besides, there's nothing quite like the tranquil fulfillment of a plan gone right.

Except the shoulders could probably fit him and Catherine together.

His project, his bet, his risks: Atrus grabs pins and needle and scampers off to his work desk to baste a better fit before his judge comes back from Tay.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

There's talk of oil being discovered all over the place and Atrus could not, in all honesty, care less for combustibles, but the world makes a rather convincing case that he is alone in this sentiment.

As has become customary every couple of years in the past decade, he links to his old study in Chroma'agana, now little more than a hub, a primitive Nexus, and from there to fetch his mail to a spot in the desert ten minutes out of town. But the town has stretched like an exploded spore since the last time he visited: the hollow rock that hides his Book is already in sight of the first line of buildings. The lights in 'his' abandoned house are on and people chat around the dinner table. No signs of the parcel that should have been waiting for him in the mailbox.

Good for them. What else can he say? Good for them. He didn't need those fustian trousers and jacket, per se, but they sure looked warm and comfortable in the catalogue.

Good for them.

He burns the Book as he links back. He will not come back to this place.

 

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

Which is not to say he gives up. He just takes care of other projects for a while, same as he's always kept himself occupied, with Writing, experiments in this and other Ages, without looking for a new opportunity until it all but knocks at Tomahna's door. It's one of these newfangled 'Routes', so say its signs, that are crossing the country, and along the roadside come places to shop and rest. Some thrive, others do not. An abandoned gas station becomes his new address.

“Hey!”

Atrus saw the vehicle, a delivery van of sorts according to the writings on its sides, parked in the layby as he came in. It occurs to him now that a driver was to be expected.

“You scared me, mister!” The other man laughs. “Came up here in the middle of nowhere, I thought you were the Orvis Ghost!”

“Stay assured, my friend, that I am flesh and bone.”

“I can see that! 's just an urban tale.”

“I beg your pardon. A what?”

His companion shrugs it off, but seems eager to talk. Atrus smiles: the desert tends to have that effect on some travellers.

“A scare for couriers! Say there used to be this haunted place in the town down East which placed orders for the finest sports clothes. Nobody in town's ever been seen wearin' them and there's not a single soul for miles. Disappeared years ago, it did.”

“This is how it ends? Nobody knew what happened?”

“That's it, yeah. Well the tale's scarier at night. But it's still all rubbish.”

Taking good care to hide the markings on the pack he is carrying, Atrus wouldn't be so sure.

 

*

 

“Catherine? What do you think of–”

He draws his breath and lets the question die: nobody is going to answer anymore anyway. Atrus is alone in the living room and he will have to come to terms with this fact or his heart will break trying.

Better to focus on practical matters for now. Such as the letter he has just taken out of the latest envelope, which asks for the moon. Figuratively. If all they needed was a specific kind of moon orbiting around a sky, well, that could be arranged – he fancied himself something of an expert on moons ever since that time he almost died in a collision (an unfortunate occurrence which was never once repeated, thus giving solid ground to his private claims).

Instead, the letter asks its valued customer to comply with the recent Federal regulations and provide, for the benefit of their company register, some sort of alphanumeric sequence he is supposed to glean from nondescript official identification papers. The step is required for future shipments.

Come to think of it, he wasn't even born in the United States.

 

*

 

There is a hole in his linen smock.

Atrus takes one of Catherine's old modified needles, it really is kids' play to thread them, a blessing with his eyesight these days, and knots the floss.

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Yuletide!! I'm afraid I couldn't research the historical context as thoroughly as I would have wanted, apologies if something slipped despite my checks. But I really, really hope that this can come as a welcome gift. :)


End file.
